queennight

My feelings on writing completely individual personal statements:

Eek. My mistake. Guess that would explain that one ...

Seems like such a horribly strange situation. I'm assuming office hours are out of the question? Either way, good luck, and hoping that it all works out!

Your tone is really unnecessarily nasty and I'm not 100% sure why. I wouldn't say anybody here is arguing about this topic - just discussing the statistics and questioning what is the best route for post-PhD success. Of course an Ivy league will help you get a job, but the question is: how much, and for what careers. Also, Ivy League is a misnomer in this situation: Dartmouth and Brown don't place in the 'top 6' rankings of US News anyways. (Source here)

BAHAH amazing

Ugh, I empathize with you so much on this. When I was applying to my MA program, one of my letter writers nearly bowed out with a day to go - luckily the letter ended up getting submitted, but my stress levels were through the roof. Even for these PhD applications, one of my LORs got submitted with pretty much a minute to spare. Giving you good vibes - I would reiterate what Wyatt says though. Worst case scenario, definitely turn to another prof if this original one is completely ignoring this situation.

That's absolutely nuts! I'd be so skeptical that it actually was Purdue, but I guess kudos to the department for reaching out.

I WISH I HAD MORE UPVOTES

Seriously though - not really. I think it's important to vaguely professionalize your Google search anyways - and you can do that with Academia pages or even LinkedIn if you're looking for a more traditional way. Most of my friends (myself included) altered our Facebook profiles and other social media to not link directly to our names (whether that be by using your alternate parent's last name if applicable, or a pseudonym) when we applied to graduate schools/professional schools/started to enter the 'real world'. If you're concerned, now is probably the appropriate time to change your Instagram or Twitter handle so that you can maintain your personal space. If you're worried or a bit nervous, it's better to be safe than sorry, and deleting your MySpace account from grade 8 is probably going to be beneficial anyways, whether you end up accepting a PhD program or not.

My 2nd year Introduction to Poetry class that I took purely out of interest. It is the reason why I am where I am today! While it might not have been the best or even the most academic of courses, it launched me into this field, so that was pretty rad.

Netflix added Friends, so I'm basically in a coma of television right now. I feel you.

I love this hahah you're officially my superstar

Adding to Chadillac's point, I thought the term 'foreign university' was a strange category in the table. Does that refer to European institutions? Are Canadian institutions 'foreign' despite being in North America? Does 'foreign' refer to Arabic schools? It was a strange phrase to use. However, I thought the article was an informative read, and definitely reinforced my fears about the English PhD in general; there are definitely parts about it that seemed not-entirely-100%, but it does re-establish what many of my professors have mentioned to me about the elitism of the job market in general.

Wow! I know that you're applying to the American Studies MA, but that sounds like an incredible paper. I never thought to connect Marxism with Morrison, it'd be interesting to see how you did that (especially from a perspective of body politics).

Not in Comp Lit, but this is an incredible belief and I am right beside you on this one.

I wrote entirely based on research. I don't think there's any harm in adding your teaching experience (and it most likely is a boost!) but the majority of the SOP is normally dedicated to research, from what I understand.

SO MANY OPTIONS AA

Hi drownsoda! I echo exactly what hreaðemus says. Come join the English lit forum - it's provided me with so many resources, I really couldn't have made it through the application season without the friendly advice from everyone over there. Your GPA sounds incredible, and I don't think there's any real concern with any of your materials! As you clearly say yourself, you have done a ton of work compiling everything - now it's just about destressing and waiting everything out. The problem with English Literature as a graduate area of study is that so much is left to chance: half the time (you've probably seen from perusing different threads), excellent applicants are glossed over because their interests simply don't fit with what a department's resources are capable of handling. The discipline is still young and relatively subjective, so a lot of this can be left up to chance. With all of that being said, there's no reason to fear that you won't get in somewhere - your GPA is excellent (I remember reading somewhere that most grad school cGPA averages were around 3.3-3.6, so at a 3.8 outside your major, you're very strong!) and it sounds like you have a strong drive and passion for what it is that you do. Your head isn't in the clouds! There's no reason to not try. You should be exceptionally proud of yourself for braving the horrific couple months of preparing applications (a nightmare of GREs, writing samples, PSs, etc.). Once your applications are in, the purgatory definitely will set in. It sounds like you've got a lot of anxiety right now (don't we all), but at the least, you should be incredibly proud of having completed this process. There are a lot of people who simply balk after seeing the amount of material that an English PhD-wannabe has to prepare to apply to a significant number of schools. More importantly, I'd keep in mind that there's always going to be a second opportunity. Even if you don't get in this round (devastating, sure, but hundreds of people go through this as well!), you can always choose to take a year off and re-apply, or maybe go into a Plan B discipline somewhere else with your English degree (teaching, law, marketing, advertising, PR, HR, freelancing, all come to mind). You will be okay. We all will be okay. I can hear the somewhat frantic anxiety in your post (trust me, we're all going through the same thing!) but at the end of the day, a bunch of decisions made at one moment will not make or break you. If this is what you really want to do, you can always try again. As I am an English major, I'll throw a quote at you right now: "To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again." - Ralph Waldo Emerson. Sometimes it takes a couple of times to get the ball fully into the basket, and there's no shame in picking yourself up and trying again. In fact, I think that it proves you have an indomitable will and courage that greatly exceeds that of the ordinary individual. Anyways, if all of that positivity fails to help destress you, there's also always alcohol.

I'm not sure what's worse, the actual harangue of applications or the stress of now waiting it out. (And by waiting it out, I mean compulsively checking my email about 10 times every hour!)

A friend of mine sent me a hockey holiday card over email and I literally jolted with fear until I realized it was her. It's going to be a long couple of months. I'm feeling a bit like Kris right now, while Kim is basically my department's listserv.

Also, calculated that all in all, probably spent around $700 CAD on applications without including the price of the GRE tests/books/etc and transcripts. So that's a nice little Christmas gift on my Mastercard statement.

Shout-out to all you applicants who applied to +7 schools. I just submitted my last application today (6 in total) and I feel like my brain has been squelched by a truck.

100%.